PayPal’s Arrival in Nigeria: Why I Think It’s Bullsh*t

Last Monday (June 16, 2014), I stumbled upon the news that PayPal is finally coming to Nigeria. And I was excited. Why won’t I be?

For the past three years, I’ve been unable to receive payment directly from my foreign clients due to PayPal’s unavailability to Nigerians. (But thanks to Payoneer and other alternatives that came to my rescue.)

Because I just don’t take any news item until I read it from authoritative sources, I clicked the link to the original source. And I confirmed that it’s true.

But after reading down a couple of lines, my eyes caught the shocker that read:

Initially, PayPal is only offering “send money” services for consumers to pay for goods and services at PayPal-enabled merchant sites while safeguarding their financial details. This is free to consumers and covered by fees it charges merchants.

“We think we can give our sellers selling into this market a great deal of reassurance,” said Keeley, a former regional banking executive with Standard Chartered Plc and senior executive with payment card company Visa Inc.

PayPal does not yet cover peer-to-peer transactions, which allow consumers to send money to other consumers. It has not yet enabled local merchants in the new markets to receive payments, nor is it offering other forms of banking services, he said.

And I could say was, “Damn!”

So, PayPal was only going to offer a send-only solution after all. We can’t receive funds, and we can’t withdraw funds. All we can do is send money. Nothing more.

So, if that’s all PayPal could offer, I’m not impressed in the least. And I have no reason to start using their service yet, even though I’ve already registered and verified my account.

I’m sure I’m not alone in this. Many other Nigerian internet marketers and freelancers will share my line of thinking because they need PayPal for receiving and withdrawing funds — not sending funds.

However, I know that this development will be of great help to many other Nigerians — those who need PayPal for sending payments. You have every reason to be excited if all you need PayPal for is paying online for Fiverr gigs, themes, software packages, online subscriptions, ebooks, and other products.

You were able to stumble to the page and maybe your information seems incorrect or they do not say what they mean. I registered for it 2 days after its official launch in Nigeria with Firstbank and I can send and as well receive funds on it.

I’m very sure what you said is not true. Nigerian PayPal accounts cannot receive funds! If you’ve received funds with your Nigerian PayPal account, show me the evidence, and I’ll eat up my words. It’s either you don’t understand how the thing works, or you probably misunderstood the word “receive”.

Hmm, for people like me that are norvice in internet stuff, this is an eye opener:o so its that useless now without recieving and withdrawing funds. So pls is perfectmoney another alternative for recieving and withdrawing.

I’m sorry Abass, but I agree with Paul (excluding the ‘Abass, please stop promoting the paypal’ part). The security services of paypal should be upgraded rather than attaching these repelling limitations. Or is the company trying to say that even if its security services are at its peaks, fraudsters will still have their way? If that’s the case, then I guess paypal isn’t safe to use. As for paypal trying to limit Africans, that will be ridiculous if it’s true. Who do they take us for? Persons that can be impressed with settling for anything other than the best? I’m not sure of what they stand to gain by doing this, but I don’t doubt what they will lose: So many Nigerians who will not feel the slightest need for a paypal account. On the part of foreigners who were really duped, and those who claimed to be, what’s the concern of paypal with that? They’ll still get duped–probably even more–without paypal. For God’s sake, most of them never personally knew those they sent money to nor was a proper background check done as the case may be. Who does that? If you ask me, I’ll say stupid persons and/or liars. All said, the security services of paypal should be improved and people, funny to say, should please be advised to be prudent with their money. When paypal is ready to present us with the best of their services, I’ll consider opening an account with them.

Interesting comments so far. I actually don’t think it’s BS yet. I remember a time when Nigerians were denied access totally from Paypal due to what our brothers were using the platform for.
It’s only logical that the owners of Paypal are very cautious in opening up to Nigerians again. Let’s face it. There are lots of scammers out there who try to take advantage of the foreigners. White man or no white man, nobody likes to be duped.
That being said, I think it’s just a smoothing phase, Nigeria has a very large marketbase and I’m sure it will not take much longer before Nigerians are given access to more features on the Paypal Platform. Lets just beg our yahoo yahoo brothers to take it easy!!!

Even African countries who have been approved for PayPal long before Nigeria have never gone beyond the “Send only” clause. (I’m not sure of South Africa, though). But PayPal users from Ghana and other African countries can only send, too. So, it’s not peculiar to Nigeria.

With the above in mind, I don’t see the “send only” clause removed anytime soon. It seems PayPal wants to restrict Africans generally–fraud or no fraud. But nonetheless, half a loaf is better than no bread.

I realy don’t like d limitation paypal imposed on Nigerian, but lets hope they will do justics to it. Please sir, it has been more than 3 month I apply for my payoner Master Card but since then I have not getting any reply, can I use infonlinks to apply for the card? Or should I still give them time.

I can’t help wondering why any right thinking Nigerian would be delighted about PayPal’s incursion into Nigeria. Can someone please tell me what benefit we stand to gain, if any. Is there anything I can do on their Platform that cannot be achieved through any of my local debit or credit card? NONE. So what’s the excitement about? I would strongly recommend that all right thinking Nigerians should ditch PayPal. They branded us all as fraudulent even though the magnitude of fraud in one American state is more than a million times that perpetrated by Nigerians. Thanks to Visa and Mastercard who came to our rescue in time.

Dear all please ditch PayPal and use your local cards to pay your school fees and other services and goods you buy online.

Abbas, please stop promoting PayPal. We don’t need their services and we’re not begging them. They should go and ask the likes of Mastercard to know how much they’ve lost so far by not opening their services to Nigerians so far.

Your indirect attack on those who are delighted about PayPal’s arrival was unnecessary. The fact that you’re not impressed shouldn’t make you use the wrong words against those who are impressed.

Those who use Fiverr and some other sites that accept only PayPal have every reason to rejoice. And no, right thinking Nigerians will not ditch PayPal.

And for your information, PayPal did not just “brand Nigeria” as you claimed. Nigerians actually used the platform to swindle unsuspecting foreigners in the past, and that’s why Nigerians were disallowed from using the service.

Google the words “PayPal Nigerian Scam” and you’ll find links to the various tales of woe told by foreigners who have fallen victim to Nigerian scammers who use PayPal. So, don’t just point fingers attack others when you have little knowledge of the reason for their actions.

And finally, I’m not in any way promoting PayPal. I’m only explaining hoe Nigerians can use their service, and that’s not promotion.

I understand how you feel. But what when many others are not feeling the same way? You took it too far, brother.

GOOD DAY SIR! I GOT UR CONTACT FRM UR WEBSITE
AND MUST COMMEND UR
STRAIGHTFORWARDNESS;COZ UR INFORMATIONS ARE
GENUINE&SINCERE.PLS I
JUST WANT TO CONFIRM HOW REAL&TRUE AND
PROFITABLE IS INTERNET BUSINESS
I.E FREELANCE,SURVEYS E.T.C.COZ AV TRIED DOING
SOME BUT MOST OF THEM
ARE NOT FOR NIGERIA OR DONT EVEN HAV PAYMENT
OPTIONS FOR NIGERIANS.SO
I JUST WANT TO KNOW IF ITS PAYS SOME NIGERIANS
FOR REAL& HOW I CAN GO
ABOUT IT.AV GONE TO SO MANY SEMINARS,BOUGHT E-
BOOKS BUT THEY ALL SAY
THE SAME THING&ARE NEVER SUCCESSFUL.PLEASE GIVE
ME ALL THE INDEPTH
TRUTH ON THE REAL ONES IF ANY.THANKS.PLEASE CAN I
HAVE UR PHONE
CONTACT FOR DIRECT COMMUNICATION OR
WHATSAPP.TNXZ MR.ABASS FRM
AUSTIN.PLZ REPLY

I wasn’t impressed in the least too! Come to think of it, any merchant offering Paypal as a payment alternative also has other plethora of means which he/she can receive payments (which I have the luxury of affording as a Nigerian). The main crux of the matter was ACCEPTING PAYMENTS – especially from clients who just won’t use any other method to pay me!

Sometimes, I feel the white man imagines we are just a consuming lot and nothing more! While not open up (but strictly monitor the accounts?) But then again, I blame my brothers who only understand the language of ‘fast money’. As I wish for better days ahead, I have no other choice than to also wish more severe punishments for advance fee fraud!

with the way it stands,We are only generating money for other countries but i think it’s a good development though,atleast we all have “PayPals” but the only thing i recommend every one to do is to ditch their “services” if they don’t offer peer to peer transaction and “Funds Withdrawal” within two months

when i read d news a few days ago,
I bcame more sad bcoz wen i 1st heard it, i ws happy, bt wen i found out dat wat m happy abt is nonsense, i ws really sad,
I didn’t evn attempted openin a paypal acc since it wn’t b useful 4 me

Please can I use paypal to pay school fees online.
I am currently doing an online masters program and I am pay installmental fees. My bank does the trasanction for me but the service charge is way high.
Also, is the payapl account servicable by my normal local account?
Thank you

If the program you’re running accept payment through PayPal, then you can pay with PayPal. Yes, your local account provides the funds for each PayPal transaction you make. And that’s why you’re required to link a working card before you can send payments.